As with every profession in the world, farming comes with its own set of unique challenges. This slide show of pictures I took last summer highlight four different problems we worked through while growing our crops.
The Colorado Potato Beetle
The first photo in the slide show clearly depicts the devastation of the Colorado Potato Beetle. This single potato plant demonstrates what would happen to our entire crop if the population of pests was left unchecked.
Seed Contamination
The second photo shows seed contamination. The tall corn stalk does not belong in our sweet corn field. It is grain corn and meant for animal feed. Our employees know to avoid picking this corn for our sweet corn table.
Volunteer Corn
There are many corn plants scattered through the field of potatoes in the third picture. During the previous year, this field had a crop of corn planted on it. The corn plants voluntarily grew from corn kernels that were missed by the combine when the corn was harvested.
Drought
2016 brought one of the driest years in recent memory. The crippling effect on our crops is illustrated in the fourth picture. While irrigation was a benefit for some of our crops, we do not have the capability to irrigate every field. The lack of water caused smaller potatoes and a lower yield per plant than we hoped for.
To find out more about how we grow potatoes, you can follow this link to “Spud Smarts: About Growing Potatoes.”
The Colorado Potato Beetle
The first photo in the slide show clearly depicts the devastation of the Colorado Potato Beetle. This single potato plant demonstrates what would happen to our entire crop if the population of pests was left unchecked.
Seed Contamination
The second photo shows seed contamination. The tall corn stalk does not belong in our sweet corn field. It is grain corn and meant for animal feed. Our employees know to avoid picking this corn for our sweet corn table.
Volunteer Corn
There are many corn plants scattered through the field of potatoes in the third picture. During the previous year, this field had a crop of corn planted on it. The corn plants voluntarily grew from corn kernels that were missed by the combine when the corn was harvested.
Drought
2016 brought one of the driest years in recent memory. The crippling effect on our crops is illustrated in the fourth picture. While irrigation was a benefit for some of our crops, we do not have the capability to irrigate every field. The lack of water caused smaller potatoes and a lower yield per plant than we hoped for.
To find out more about how we grow potatoes, you can follow this link to “Spud Smarts: About Growing Potatoes.”
RSS Feed
